When did saving someone’s life ruin yours?
A Life Saved, a Future Threatened
When did saving someone’s life ruin yours? Students at my high school were forbidden from entering the teacher workroom under any circumstances.
If you even poked your head in, you got detention. Miss Baker was my AP chemistry teacher and the only reason I had a shot at getting into college.
She wrote me recommendation letters and actually gave a whether I understood the material. She also had severe asthma that had been getting worse all winter.
She kept her emergency inhaler in her desk drawer in the classroom, but I’d noticed her using it more often. Sometimes she used it three times during one class period.
She’d pause mid-sentence, take a hit, and keep teaching like it was normal. A few times she’d had to sit down and let us work independently while she caught her breath.
We all pretended not to notice because she was the best teacher we had. Nobody wanted her to take medical leave.
One day she mentioned her doctor had prescribed a stronger inhaler. She kept it in the workroom because it was expensive and she didn’t want it stolen from her desk.
She joked that it cost more than her car payment. This wasn’t really funny because we all knew teachers made money.
She’d been trying to get approval to keep it in the classroom. However, the administration said controlled medications had to stay in locked areas, meaning the nurse’s office or the workroom.
I’d been staying after school that Thursday to retake a test I’d bombed because my dad had been in the hospital that week.
Miss Baker had offered to let me retake it, even though her policy was no retakes. She knew I’d been at the hospital every night.
She was supposed to be grading while I tested. But she’d gone to get her regular inhaler from her desk and realized it was empty.
She stood up to go to the workroom for her emergency inhaler. Suddenly, she couldn’t even make it to the door.
Her wheezing turned into this horrible whistling sound, and she collapsed against her desk, gasping like a fish out of water.
Her lips were turning blue and her eyes were huge with panic. I ran to the door and screamed for help, but it was after 4:00 and the hallways were empty.
The nurse had left at 3:30 like always.
The work room was just three doors down. Miss Baker managed to gasp out, “Work room, inhaler, shelf by coffee.”
I ran to the workroom and yanked the door open. I found her inhaler exactly where she said and grabbed it. I was running back when I saw them.
The final exams for every AP class were spread out on the big table, including mine.
Chemistry equations I’d been struggling with for weeks were right there. The answers were printed below them.
I only saw them for maybe two seconds, but my brain photographed everything. Those were the exact problems I couldn’t solve.
Miss Baker was barely conscious when I got back. I helped her use the inhaler, holding it steady because her hands were shaking too bad.
It took three doses before she could breathe normally again.
She kept thanking me while we waited for the paramedics, saying I’d saved her life. She didn’t know I just accidentally destroyed my entire future by seeing those tests.
I thought maybe it wouldn’t matter. I hadn’t meant to look.
I was saving someone’s life. But Cameron had been in the hallway and saw me come out of the workroom.
His dad was on the school board and Cameron hated me because I’d beaten him for validictorian. He reported it immediately, probably before Miss Rodriguez even got to the hospital.
The next morning, Principal Harris called me into his office. He had security footage pulled up on his computer showing me exiting the workroom with the inhaler.
Miss Baker was there too, still weak from yesterday, but trying to defend me. “She saved my life,” Miss Baker kept saying, “I would have died without that inhaler.”
Principal Harris nodded sympathetically, but pulled out a form. He said I understand the circumstances, but the fact remains that she entered the workroom and was exposed to secure testing materials.
The academic integrity policy is clear. He turned to me and said all your grades for this semester will be marked as void.
You’ll have to retake everything in summer school if you want to graduate. I felt my chest getting tight, like I was the one who couldn’t breathe.
I didn’t even mean to see them. I was saving her life.
The rule exists precisely because we can’t determine intent after the fact, he said, typing something into his computer. I’ve already notified all your teachers and the college you committed to.
